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Vincent Padois, head tutor at the Pierre and Marie Curie University who teaches robotics and is babysitting the Paris ICub, makes a demonstration with ICub robot, a ?hybrid embodied cognitive system for a humanoid robot" about 1 metre (3.2 feet) high, at the Pierre and Marie Curie University in Paris September 4, 2009. Six versions of ICub exist in laboratories across Europe, where scientists are painstakingly tweaking its electronic brain to make it capable of learning, just like a human child and hoping it will learn how to adapt its behaviour to changing circumstances, offering new insights into the development of human consciousness. REUTERS/Philippe Wojazer

Pictures of the year: Technology

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    Matsushita and Renesas to jointly develop chips: report

    TOKYO
    Wed Jan 16, 2008 6:48pm EST

    Stocks

       

    TOKYO (Reuters) - Panasonic brand maker Matsushita Electric Industrial Co Ltd (6752.T) and microchip maker Renesas Technology have agreed to tie up in developing next generation semiconductors, the Nikkan Kogyo newspaper reported on Thursday.

    Technology

    It said that unlisted Renesas, a joint venture between Hitachi Ltd (6501.T) and Mitsubishi Electric Corp (6503.T) and Matsushita would also embark on joint production of the 32-nanometer chips, it said.

    Chip makers are racing to move to tinier circuit sizes to cut production cost per chip function and enable powerful electronics that run for hours without killing the battery. But the shift also forces changes in fundamental materials and processes and exposes chip makers to huge initial costs.

    Rival Japanese chip makers Toshiba Corp. (6502.T) and NEC Electronics Corp. (6723.T) said in November they would jointly develop 32-nanometer chips.

    Samsung Electronics Co. (005930.KS), IBM (IBM.N), Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing Ltd. CSMF.SI, Infineon Technologies (IFXGn.DE), STMicroelectronics (STM.PA) and Freescale Semiconductor have said they would work through 2010 to develop and produce 32-nanometer chips. A nanometer is a billionth of a meter.

    (Reporting by Edwina Gibbs)
    Technology


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